The Runner
Driving, he sees a woman running. On a crosswalk overhead. Her skin behind the wire fence.
The first thing that he should do when he gets home is change into his running clothes. He should leash the dog and run.
He wants to run because he wants to be his best self, but not really because of that, and he knows it. If he runs, it’ll be because of what Mark Twain said – that there is nothing that cannot happen today, and that means maybe he’ll meet the woman and they’ll like each other, and that’s all that he’s ever really wanted in this world.
But that’s not going to happen. He knows it; he’s run before.
He used to run down canopy roads in Southern towns and be dappled by the sun. He used to run along New England streams and listen. It was beautiful, but he was alone and sometimes he felt panicked by his aloneness. By the houses in the distance with the doors and windows closed. Like his view of hell, which has no fire, but only a white emptiness with no sound but his own breathing. A being forgotten by society. A man in Tamms.
And he has run in the city too. Stopped at every light to let the cars pass. People who seem to know where they are going. He does not. He runs up and down streets like it means something.
But still, when he gets home, he should run. For his heart. For his lungs. You’re not flexible enough for a man your age, his wife tells him.
But when he gets home, he doesn’t run. Nor does he wash the dishes. Nor does he fry the sausage, though it soon will turn. Instead, he thinks of Takemitsu, who ruled his mortality by writing In The Woods as he was dying.
He remembers how he once told his wife that he wanted to play In The Woods.
Well then, you should.
But, it might take me three years to do it.
That time is going to pass anyway, so you might as well learn to play it.
May 4, 2009 at 08:54 p
There are days I want to run, and days I want to lie in the grass and watch the clouds pass overhead.
These are lying days. Though when it rains here in Portland, I run.
May 16, 2009 at 05:54 p
Me too. I need to do more of both.
May 5, 2009 at 04:12 p
I’ve had a hard time commenting on this piece because there is so much to ponder. This entire story is one of introspection. Meanwhile, your character’s hell is living, solitary introspection. Your character doesn’t tell his wife what he wants. He remembers once telling his wife what he then wanted. In the present, she tells him that he is inflexible, unyielding, not adaptive enough.
Yet the only thing this character has ever really wanted is a single chance encounter that he admits will never happen. In the present, he can’t even bring himself to cook a sausage that’s about to turn. Instead, he lives in his private Tamms, hearing himself breathe, remembering watching others through gates and closed doors and feeling alone.
As usual, your wordsmanship is clever and spot on. He wanted (not “wants”) to play in the woods (or In The Woods). He has stopped whenever told and let others drive past. Now, in the present, he doesn’t know where he is going. Instead, he runs nowhere like it means something.
Yes, he remembers once telling his wife that he wanted to play In The Woods — Takemitsu’s penultimate work. The story begs the reader to ask how long ago that was. Three years? More?
Awesome writing. I feel like I’ve only scratched the surface. I’ll be back to re-read it.
May 5, 2009 at 05:39 p
It’s really humbling to know that you took the time to think about this and even research the references.
You are a wonderful reader.